TWO HEALTHY 21 YEAR-OLDS DROWN IN PUBLIC POOL WHILE DOING MILITARY-STYLE UNDERWATER BREATHING EXERCISES
Comment: This is the time of year when I'm usually reporting on pool-drowning accidents. Usually involving small children, I remind pool-owners to fence-in their pools and lock their gates to avoid potentially fatal accidents. And use a pool alarm that triggers if a small child falls in. And if you're in the house and small children are in the pool, that's not good enough. You need to be supervising, not socializing.
But the news piece I mention below - reported in our local newspapers - just takes the cake. Two healthy, strong, 21 year-old young men drowned in an accident. Together. In a public pool.
From: New York attorney Gary E. Rosenberg (personal injury and accident attorney and lawyer; serving Brooklyn Queens Bronx; Queens Brooklyn accident injury lawyer)
RELATED POSTS:
TODDLER IN CRITICAL CONDITION AFTER STATEN ISLAND DROWNING ACCIDENT (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on May 30, 2010)
TWELVE YEAR-OLD HARLEM GIRL DROWNS IN TRAGIC BEACH ACCIDENT WHILE ON NYC SCHOOL OUTING (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on June 26, 2010)
WARM WEATHER COMING: CPSC WARNS ABOUT DROWNING ACCIDENTS (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on April 27, 2011)
TODDLER CRITICALLY INJURED IN POOL DROWNING ACCIDENT (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on May 24, 2010)
ELEVEN YEAR-OLD DROWNS IN FRIEND'S POOL IN LONG ISLAND (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on June 18, 2010)
A PARTICULARLY HORRIBLE WAY TO DROWN (Posted by Brooklyn injury attorney Gary E. Rosenberg on March 1, 2010)
When: Wednesday, July 13, 2011, at about 8:30 AM.
Where: Public swimming pool, Lyons Pool in Staten Island, New York.
What: Two young men who wanted to be Navy SEALS - elite navy combat divers - drowned while practicing breath-holding exercises at a Staten Island pool. One was unconscious when rescued, and the other drowned before he could be taken out of the pool. Two working lifeguards and some 20 swimmers missed seeing the accident.
The two friend were floating face-down in the 3-foot-deep shallow end of the pool and were only spotted when a lifeguard whistled the end of an adult swim session.
Who: Bohdan Vitenko, age 21, died at Richmond University Medical Center. His Air Force-bound buddy, Jonathan Proce, 21, was revived and is in critical condition.
Authorities pointed out that two of the men's friends were also in the water at the time, but were not exercising.
How: Both men, who were in excellent shape, suffered heart attacks. Proce actually worked elsewhere as a New York City lifeguard.
Why: It's not clear if the two were following official training guidelines, or if they had constructed their own workout.
Vitenko and Proce, along with two other friends, worked out regularly at the municipal pool since it opened for the season some two weeks ago.
Their workout included underwater sit-ups and swimming laps.
Either way, the military advises against certain breath-holding exercises or swimming underwater at length to avoid "shallow water blackout," which can lead to drowning.
City Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe was quoted as saying, that the incident was a "tragic and inconceivable accident."
